


tides will bring me back to you;

by yavanei



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, kisses in the rain because i'm really sappy like that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-07
Updated: 2014-10-07
Packaged: 2018-02-20 06:10:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,478
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2417906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yavanei/pseuds/yavanei
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>We all burn. We burn in blood, and memories fade. Try to hold on, try to keep everything you love close, but everything burns itself alive eventually.</p>
<p>There are scars on her body that belong to her, but they were put there by <i>him</i>.</p>
<p>She was taught loyalty, not love. She was taught discipline, but never desire.</p>
            </blockquote>





	tides will bring me back to you;

Assume the worst. Live another day.

The rain pounds against black basalt stones, whipping against the pavement of an ancient street in Rome where a history of ruin and rebirth spans more than two and a half thousand years.

Everyone is born in blood, and everyone dies in blood.

Around her there are sounds of windows and doors being slammed shut, and people run past her, making haste to escape the downpour.

He stands silent. They face each other, two pairs of shoes squared off about two feet from one another. Rain beats down his back, seeping through his coat and his jeans.

Her instincts tell her to be on guard. Her training tells her not to let him any closer, to gauge the approximate distance necessary for retreat and attack, to zero in on every possible vulnerability in order to deal maximum damage.

She can see the wheels turning in his mind, sees it behind the barely hidden rage in his eyes. Did he always look so angry, she wonders, like a storm about to swallow her and everyone around him whole?

There’s a crack of thunder, then. Natasha stifles a laugh. She never meant to be so cliché. Clouds darken overhead, and the clear blue sky turns pitch black.

She ignores her training – the worst be damned. There’s a trust between monsters, you see. There’s an understanding.

_I blew all my covers. I got to go figure out a new one._

In Washington, he moves in ways he shouldn’t. They say he’s a machine; an instrument of raw efficiency. But he moves like he’s stalking prey. He moves like he _enjoys_ it. Languid limbs, a slow saunter. It’s disturbing and entrancing, because there’s someone there beneath the surface.  

Scrub, scrub, scrub as much as you like, but you can’t erase the human from the machine.

He looks the same as before – only he doesn’t, it’s not exact.  He is different now. He moves in ways that are uncertain. Aimless, she thinks, like a lost rudder at sea.

His body is a tool, and when tools are left uncared and unused, they rust. His body is a shallow case of regret and fear and guilt bleeding and gushing at the edges and seeping through the cracks.

She doesn’t know him. (Or does she?)

But he has kissed her twice already.

Deep, twisted, and murderous once on her abdomen.

Fast, intent, and provoked once on her shoulder.

She remembers rain. She remembers…

A boot in someone’s back. A garrote around another’s neck. Sterile, white rooms. Surgical equipment and ballet slippers. Crimson splattered across her shirt like paint and fire, fire, fire.

She remembers burning bodies, ash and soot and blackened fingertips. Black under her nails. Black in her hair. Black in her lungs.

Don’t you know? We all burn. We burn in blood, and memories fade. Try to hold on, try to keep everything you love close, but everything burns itself alive eventually.

There are scars on her body that belong to her, but they were put there by _him._

She was taught loyalty, not love. She was taught discipline, but never desire.

 

 

 

 

Through the mist, he can see her – hidden behind a finely threaded veil. Tiny drops of rain ping off the top of the black umbrella shielding her.

He wants to speak.

There’s bloody metal lodged in his throat.

His heart ticks down each minute, rotting skin stretched too taut over bones that shouldn’t be so sturdy.

He closes his eyes and waits. The passage of time is startlingly new to him. Hours, days, and even years, swept past him while he wasted away in frozen storage.

Everything degrades, but an eternity could have passed and he would still remain.

This moment hangs in time, minutes crawling like a slow pulse behind shuttered eyes – he tries to save it, to savor this landmark so it cannot be blotted out.

He fears forgetting more than anything now. He knows it’s irrational, he knows there’s no one alive who can force him to forget again – knows because he put them all in the ground where they belong. But he fears his own vulnerability. He fears… he fears his own weakness. Sometimes he wishes he’d been stronger, faster, smarter, sometimes he lays awake in bed at night and blames himself for all the terrible things that happened to him.

When he opens his eyes, she is still there. Her head tilts, her fine eyebrows knit together as she evaluates him. There’s a question on her lips, but she lowers her eyes – chews at the inside of her mouth.

He assaults and plunders and scratches at every corner and crevice of his brain as he does too often, trying to piece himself and the fragments together.

He remembers rain. He remembers…

Wet mud and grass crunching under combat boots. Gags wet with chemical being shoved in mouths.

Crimson draining down a gutter. A slick knife being withdrawn from a back.

He remembers things he wishes he didn’t.

She blinks, and so does he.

Natasha lets her umbrella fall to the street, takes two assured steps toward him.

There’s a rush of air, a shaky exhale from his lips as his muscles relax.

He blinks again, and looks deep into her eyes. Can you trace the passage of time when you weren’t there to witness it pass? He sees it in his peripheral, it burns at his eyelashes, it stings at the edges of his vision. He hears his own mutilated voice crying into the air.

The torrent of rain hammers over her in heavy waves, soaking through her hair and across her leather peplum jacket. She smiles at him then, playfulness in her expression, openness in her eyes, and he thinks he’s never seen anyone so _free._

He thinks he sees a map to tomorrow, to stolen hours, stolen days, and stolen years in the outline of her face.

The prison he calls a body collapses around him.

He sets his shoulders and straightens to his full height. He takes two steps forward to meet her, slow, but _sure_ in a way he hasn’t felt in months.

Though his eyes are rimmed red like all the blood between them, the rain washes it away.

Rain washes everything away.

 

 

 

 

She doesn’t know him. (Or does she?)

But she thinks there is a part of her that knows how he tastes.

He slips a glove from his left hand, and cold metal meets her cheek. His fingers shake against her wet skin, and she sees the unspoken wrath in his eyes evaporate.

What was it they said? _Never make homes out of people, Natalia._

She was never good at following rules – _has_ never been. She just wanted to be free. He just wanted a purpose.

There are shadows and marks on her body from a past life. There are places he has touched, and she doesn’t know how, or why, but it is familiar and new and forgotten all at once.

She’s a sinner, but there are skeletons enough in both their closets.

Black Widow. Some call her the most dangerous woman alive. They say she strangles her lovers in their sleep. She tried to strangle him once. He didn’t let her.

He’s watching her now, hungry and _aware_.

Every time they meet, it is for the first time. Every time they kiss, it is for the first time.

Her fingers slide beneath his coat, gripping and tugging at his soaking shirt. She runs her tongue against his bottom lip, tasting rainwater and a recognizable, but decidedly cold sensation. He’s lacing metal fingers through her flesh ones, and she can’t help but notice how well they match.

“Did you forget?” she whispers the question into his mouth.

She doesn’t know what she means by it, because… what is there to forget? What is there to remember?

But he answers…

"I don’t forget a redhead like you that easily.”

She shivers in his grasp, and if not for the warmth of his body against hers, she would swear she was drowning in this ocean of rain.

She loses herself in his lips, loses herself in the way her fingers run through his moist hair and fall so perfectly against the nape of his neck.

He’s all teeth and desperation and _want_ , groaning low into her mouth. There’s another rumble of thunder, and it reverberates around them. He follows the pattern of the noise, driving another breathless kiss against her lips.

Water drips from their bodies and taps, taps, taps, at the pavement, running through irregularities and between small spaces and gaps in the stones.

She doesn’t know him. (Or does she?)

It doesn’t matter.

 

You see...

 

The Winter Soldier is a myth.

 

The Black Widow is a legend.

 

But James Barnes?

 

But Natasha Romanoff?

 

They’re just flesh and blood. Breakable. Bendable. They’re _human._

 

**Author's Note:**

> kinda sorta inspired by the other buckynat fic i'm working on, which you can find [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2264889/chapters/4974873)


End file.
